A Classical Meiji Garden

Text and Photos by Leslie McGuire, managing editor

This arching white sycamore frames the peninsula with its 70-year-old sago palms, cypress, lilies and black pines that were trained to grow sideways in a Japanese nursery. The boulder edged beach in the foreground is planted with miniature bamboo.

The Storrier-Stearns Japanese Garden in Pasadena is the oldest true Meiji garden in California and was designed by master Japanese landscape designer Kinzuchi Fujii (1875 to 1957). Construction began in 1937 and was almost complete when Fujii was relocated to an internment camp soon after the outbreak of World War II. It is a rare extant pre-war Meiji garden still retaining its original design and many of its architectural and ornamental features.

The task of selecting and placing stones sometimes fell to members of the kawaramono, or “river-bed people,” a group of outcasts living along the riverbanks of Kyoto’s Kamo River. In at least one instance, a kawaramono became not only a garden designer but also a general advisor to the shogun in matters of aesthetics (Zen’ami, 1386-1482). Each rock in this garden was personally chosen by Fujii from the Santa Inez Mountains.

This Meiji garden is considered the acme of Kinzuchi Fujii’s oeuvre. In 1935 Ellamae Storrier Stearns hired Fujii to supervise construction of a two-acre Japanese garden on her estate in Pasadena. Even though the mansion ultimately had to be torn down, the garden has been preserved and features a 12 tatami mat Tea House, two large ponds, five bridges, a 15-foot waterfall, a ten-foot waterfall and numerous statues and stone lanterns.

Even though Fujii appeared to be aghast at the idea of placing a red bridge into his landscape (see his letter in the sidebar on page 86) Mrs. Storrier Stearns wanted one that she could see from the Tea House. The posts were all hand lathed. The lanterns, hangings and carved grill work have been replaced. The path leading to the teahouse is lined with a bamboo “forest.”

Fujii, who had arrived in San Francisco in 1903 at the age of 28, worked on the project intermittently until its completion in 1940. While the ostentatious nature of many of the ornaments seems inauthentic by post-war taste, such opulence in ornamentation was characteristic of the Meiji period gardens, which Fujii had likely seen in Japan. His garden has recently been accepted for listing by the National Trust for Historical Preservation.

This 15-foot cascading waterfall is built into the rocky cliff at the rear shore of the pond. Powered by a reversible two-horsepower pump, it is piped underground so it can direct water pulled from the pond below to one of three places: Either up the hill to the 15-foot waterfall, to the second pond located in front of the teahouse, to the 10-foot waterfall which feeds into that second pond—or any combination of the three.

History of Japanese Gardens

In 607 A.D., the first official Japanese embassy visited China. This coincided with the construction of a huge Chinese landscape park, inspiring the Japanese to construct a landscaped lake garden in front of the Imperial Palace in Japan. Zen artists later made small temple gardens that encouraged enlightenment through the art of contemplation. Zen ideas of simplicity and natural aesthetics dominate Japanese gardens.

Courtesy of Landscape Gardening in Japan, Josiah Condor

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As a reaction to all things foreign, the gardens of the Meiji Restoration Period (1868 to 1912), revived the earlier simpler cha-no-yu style of garden heavily influenced by Zen.

This Japanese red maple graces the small patio area at the beginning of the peninsula. It changes colors with the season from apple green to brilliant red or golden yellow. Beneath and behind the tree are azaleas.

Zen gardeners often try to recreate idealized landscapes and the water represents a simple lake with rocky outcroppings. Confucius (551-479 B.C.) once noted that “the wise find pleasure in water” which may suggest why water is a part of many Japanese gardens.

“Garden-making is much the same as all other branches of fine arts and the inner spirit is as much, and maybe more, important as the outward form.”
—Kinzuchi Fujii

The large spirit rocks throughout the garden may represent mountains or rocky outcroppings. They are placed in such a way as to be visually appealing from different angles in the garden. The flat stepping stones through the garden allow a path to be artistic and practical, an idea that was not used until the sixteenth century.

The peninsula that juts into the space between the two ponds is connected to the opposite side by two bridges, a devil’s bridge and a bamboo bridge, both of which were designed and constructed by Fujii. The story that generally goes with the bridge is that if the devil is chasing you, just side step, and the devil, being stupid, will fall off the end into the pond. Sago palms and black pine extend out to the tip of the peninsula framing a view of the teahouse at the end of the pond. This Devil’s bridge is made of granite and imported from Japan.

Depending upon the size and nature of the ponds, gardens that include bodies of water with islands generally include bridges connecting the islands with the shore and often with each other.

Courtesy of Landscape Gardening in Japan, Josiah Condor

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Bridges are often simple slabs of stone used singly or in combinations of two or three spans as seen in this garden. These slabs are frequently natural, uncut stones, which together with the upright stones that usually flank the ends of the bridge should be considered part of the general “stone aesthetics” of a garden. In some instances, the bridge is actually part of a dry landscape, spanning only a sand or gravel stream. Other bridge types include simple wooden structures (kibashi) sometimes consisting of logs laid parallel to one another and supported on a truss-work frame. The Chinese arched bridge (or “full moon bridge,” engetsukyo in Japanese) also survived into later periods and was sometimes employed in the same garden in which rustic slab bridges were found.

The two-acre garden area used for the two ponds and the Tea House was originally completely flat ground, which held tennis courts and a warming house for the tennis players. Fujii dug out all the earth starting at the elevation of the Waiting House, and created the ponds while building up the boulder strewn cliff mountain and waterfall at the back.

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The term “stroll garden” is self-explanatory, but it rarely implies random strolling. Japanese gardens, like all gardens, are subject to damage by the human foot, and most garden designers have been careful to direct the footsteps of visitors along paths that are clearly marked. The materials used in these paths range from carefully dressed stones, to undressed stones chosen for their flat surfaces, to raked gravel, and even to the salvaged stone column bases of destroyed temples or other buildings. Many are constructed in such a way that a visitor must move carefully and slowly through the garden, taking time to appreciate the vistas that the path provides.

The Waiting House is just down the path from the entrance gate. It is where guests waited for the formal invitation to go the rest of the way to the tea house. Although formal Japanese gardens used stepping stones to create paths—ultimately to slow down the walker and create “view spots” as they strolled—the path here was paved over to accommodate Mrs. Storrier Sterns wheelchair in her later years.

The pond gardens of Japan range from the simplest meeting of land and water—only a line of wooden posts marking the border—to rocky shores suggesting cliffs rising from the sea. Between these two extremes is the pebble beach that appears to have been a major component of the earliest Imperial or noble gardens and continued to be a feature of gardens associated with the Emperor. In what seems to be a response to a principle cited in the Sakuteiki—that garden designers should recall the landscapes they have seen—many pond gardens feature rocky peninsulas punctuated by a detached “island,” a common sight off the eastern coast of Honshu.

The Garden as Shorthand

According to Samuel Newsom in his book, A Thousand Years of Japanese Gardens,1957, no two Japanese gardens are ever the same, yet certain underlying patterns of historical design and composition impart a unity and finish to these landscapes only rarely attained in western scenes of a similar nature. As one reads the so-called “secret books” of the Japanese gardener’s art, one finds descriptions of many types of gardens. There are quiet places of meditation for Buddhist priests, flowery landscapes with noisily splashing waterfalls for merchants, austere placements of stones and plantings of greenery for warriors, formal landscapes for palaces and informal intimate gardens for the tea ceremony. Then there are gardens built on hills and those constructed on level places, those representing the sea and others suggesting lakes and rivers.

This is one of three breeding ponds built at the edges of the ponds. Koi were originally in both the ponds, however in later years wild animals such as raccoons and hawks made short work of these beautiful fish. At the moment, there are mosquito fish in the ponds, which, although harder to see, prevent the insect pests from taking hold. The second waterfall, which is 10 feet high and feeds into the pond by the Tea House is planted in miniature bamboo.

All nature can be found in the Japanese garden, but the great difference between it and western landscaping is that no conscious effort is made actually to copy a natural scene. In designing a Japanese garden in the historic tradition, one strives to present an idealized, simplified view of nature and not its reality. This subjective approach, this thinking in terms of the spirit of things has given unity to the whole field of Japanese landscape architecture. Countless generations working toward this result have, with the passing centuries, built up a sort of gardener’s shorthand by means of which much can be suggested in limited space and with scant material.

In His Own Words: The Designer’s Philosophy

By 1930, Kinzuchi Fujii had been in America since 1903 and was building several small gardens in Ojai and Santa Barbara. He composed this letter with a native English-speaking friend as a way of seeking commissions.“I am a Japanese landscape artist specializing in Japanese garden building, and I am possessed of an ambition to leave a real, uncompromising Japanese garden in the United States upon my return to my home country. I am fifty years of age and my time in America is approaching an end. I was born into a family which followed the profession of landscape architecture for many generations. In my country it has been the custom that each and every branch of the work belonged to the family, and the profession has been handed down by the fathers to their sons. As a young man I planned and supervised the construction of the now famous Tea Garden of Prince Mori and many others. After completing this work I came to this country to study western landscaping, and to my keen disappointment, I have failed to find one single Japanese garden which would comport with the construction of a real Japanese garden according to the accepted practice in my country.“The chief reason for this unsatisfactory effect in Japanese garden-building in America is the ever-present reconciliation and compromise with the western idea of landscape. As a result, there is a general destruction of the very soul of the art in garden architecture, both Japanese and western. Garden-making is much the same as all other branches of fine arts and the inner spirit is as much, and maybe more, important as the outward form.“When I undertake the construction of my next garden I intend planning it strictly Japanese in design and finish, in order that I may point with pride to the complete work feeling that I have at last reached the long cherished goal. The inevitable cement lanterns and semi-circular wooden bridges for Japanese gardens are as unnecessary as paper lanterns and umbrellas are useless and vulgar in decorating a Japanese house. It is nothing but mockery. Expensive materials are not always necessary for Japanese garden-making but common timber, rocks and shrubbery, which may be found in and around the plot, should be transformed into real assets only when handled by a true artist. I may take in the natural surroundings as part of my gardens; the undulating hills may be used for the background so the farther end of the garden may be merged into it; high mountains and great expanse of water may be combined for similar effects, depending to a large extent upon the condition and location of the plot upon which the garden is to be built. With the garden thus constructed it will present the spirit of the real simplicity and quaintness inherent to the Japanese gardens without losing the Oriental elegance.

“Taking the basic idea as herein depicted and comparing the finished product with the now famous Japanese Garden in Golden Gate Park, San Francisco and the Hollywood home of Mr. (withheld), the architecture in these two gardens will be the subject of severe criticism.”